I mean, realistically, how high is the chance that someone needs to solve a general purpose problem or is in need of storing some data accessible by anyone, and, at the same time, is interested in crypto-currencies in the first place? I guess the intersection of these two sets is just too small at the moment. "Crypto" is still a village. It's like loading a Quantum computer in your car, driving to the next village with less then 500 residents, and trying to find someone who is interested in buying it from you.

but if you say that there are not really practical uses right now, only a few testimonials (cryptokities), how will the massadoption go then?How will people use cryptocurrencies then? only for payments?

but if you say that there are not really practical uses right now, only a few testimonials (cryptokities), how will the massadoption go then?How will people use cryptocurrencies then? only for payments?

This is a really good question with a difficult answer. Because what blockchain tech misses, and what has become the end goal of just about anything in this time and age, is convenience. Blockchain tech is not easy to use, it is slow and it is inefficient.

Paypal is more convenient than Bitcoin.

Dropbox is more convenient than Sia, Storj, or whatever.

AWS is more convenient than XEL, Golem and all the others.

What blockchain is and what the others are not, is being decentralized and hard to censor. Being hard to censor has seen its use in countries like Venezuela, where people have an actual real life use case for cryptocurrencies, which is hedging against hyperinflation. Let's face it, in the "western/first/developed" world, the only real mass use case of cryptocurrencies is to get more fiat money value. Most traders are happy sitting in fiat when the markets go down.

Decentralization is not that easy to come by either. The general narrative is that this would let people use and sell ressources they were unable to trade before. Like, when you get a new smartphone, you have tons of ressources you don't need. It comes with 64 GB storage, but for the first 6 months, you only need 30. With a working decentralized sharing and micropayment ecosystem, you could rent out the remaining 34 GB to a cloud storage service. If you don't use it, the processor you paid for to do stuff is doing nothing. You could rent it out. Same with internet access. Your phone could be a hotspot for others who have no direct internet access.This vision sounds nice, but it has a huge problem: the economics don't add up. For one, you'd probably earn close to nothing, a few cents a day. So little that you soon realize that it's not worth the effort you have to put into it. With all the organizing, updating, managing your tokens and all, you might be even working below minimum wage. Also, you are using much more electricity and your hardware wears off faster. At the same time, somewhere, someone has access to cheap electricity and hundreds of computers and storage units. That guy_gal is able to work at a competitve level, because he_she doesn't manage one unit, but hundreds at the same time, droppig the price and forcing out all the others who just wanted to pay for their new smartphone or whatever.Maybe this can be overcome with absolute automatisation. Say, your phone does all that stuff for you without you even noticing it. Then, maybe, you have a case.

Blockchain projects thrive under pressure, because that's what they are built for. They are tanks: Slow and inefficient under normal circumstances. You wouldn't want to get your groceries with them. But under hard, inconvenient circumstances, when normal cars crap out, they show what they are built for.

I guess this doesn't really help much. Maybe we really need a full-blown crisis to help blockchain tech reach mass adoption. But maybe we can get them in "through the backdoor" as well. For one, we still have a long way to go when it comes to convenience.

For another, we shouldn't rule out the power of games.

Games have been around since before humans existed. Even animals play. Games and playing have an extremely real life application: they help learning in a safe enviroment.

When it comes to blockchains shortcomings, here's the thing: games are supposed to be inconvenient. They are intended to present you with a challenge. At the same time, they define their own rules, which means, you have no hard-pressing real life problem to address. Provided you manage to get people interested in the first place, this an ideal enviroment to show off tech and, ideally, to evolve it.

I think I've posted here before about having a chess tournament on XEL, with multiple teams having a fixed amount of XEL and trying to write a chess algo, which uses XELs network to play chess. Now, I don't know if chess is really the best game for something like this, but the general idea still stands:

Host a tournament on XEL. Get teams of students involved. They'll learn what XEL is and what it is capable of. They'll remember when they need something to solve a problem for them.

In regards to XEL, this poses an uncomfortable question: what exactly are the advantages over centralized/semi-centralized services? What is the scenario in which XEL is preferable over those services? I don't have the answers right now, but these are important questions that need to be addressed.

Hi ttookk,

well. When you take a look at some other "decentralized computation" programs, there is no real advantage: some allow you to host your website on the network, some let you use virtual machines on other people's computers. All tasks that could be done more efficiently (both in terms of speed and cost) if you just rented an Amazon AWS instance. The beauty of XEL's design is that you are not just using crypto-currencies to purchase resources from someone. The key difference is, that you are putting your tasks on a billboard for anyone to grab, which causes a huge competition between everyone (not one virtual machine guy, but literally anyone) who is running a computation node. So let us say, I host my "NodeJS" service on one of the other projects for example, I get exactly one dude (or a couple, but certainly not all) to do that for me. In XELs case, you potentially start seeing thousands of nodes fighting simultaneously for being the first to solve your task. That is one of the major issues of quite a few projects - they seem to encourage people to work slowly lol ... I mean why would you run a fast VM or provide a good upload bandwith for that site while you also can just run it at very low speeds (and potentially get paid more)?

This principle is not new, BOINC does exactly the same with the little exception that there, you rely on volunteers with an ideologic agenda. This makes it hard to convince people to work on your simulation for your homework assignment

Thanks for the updates.Many computing nodes compete for the task,only the first solver get the bounty,other's computing is just wasted like POW of bitcoin?

In regards to XEL, this poses an uncomfortable question: what exactly are the advantages over centralized/semi-centralized services? What is the scenario in which XEL is preferable over those services? I don't have the answers right now, but these are important questions that need to be addressed.

Hi ttookk,

well. When you take a look at some other "decentralized computation" programs, there is no real advantage: some allow you to host your website on the network, some let you use virtual machines on other people's computers. All tasks that could be done more efficiently (both in terms of speed and cost) if you just rented an Amazon AWS instance. The beauty of XEL's design is that you are not just using crypto-currencies to purchase resources from someone. The key difference is, that you are putting your tasks on a billboard for anyone to grab, which causes a huge competition between everyone (not one virtual machine guy, but literally anyone) who is running a computation node. So let us say, I host my "NodeJS" service on one of the other projects for example, I get exactly one dude (or a couple, but certainly not all) to do that for me. In XELs case, you potentially start seeing thousands of nodes fighting simultaneously for being the first to solve your task. That is one of the major issues of quite a few projects - they seem to encourage people to work slowly lol ... I mean why would you run a fast VM or provide a good upload bandwith for that site while you also can just run it at very low speeds (and potentially get paid more)?

This principle is not new, BOINC does exactly the same with the little exception that there, you rely on volunteers with an ideologic agenda. This makes it hard to convince people to work on your simulation for your homework assignment

Thanks for the updates.Many computing nodes compete for the task,only the first solver get the bounty,other's computing is just wasted like POW of bitcoin?

I guess the other computing power is just not used in this case and not actually wasted. But might be wrong here

Thanks for the updates.Many computing nodes compete for the task,only the first solver get the bounty,other's computing is just wasted like POW of bitcoin?

Depends on how you would define "wasted". XEL is built to solve computing problems without a predetermined outcome, if that makes sense. Like, you want to find the (short) private key to a known hash. Let's say you forgot your five digits password (you should probably not have a five digit password, but whatever). You can't "compute" this in the sense that the computer gets the question, solves one equasion and has the answer. It has to try different inputs, compute them, compare the result, then try again. In the sense that all inputs will be garbage except one (or probably a few) which is valid, yes, there is a lot of computing power "wasted". But in the sense that this is still the only sensible way we know to solve such questions, no, it is not wasted.

This is a great project. I want to know if the platform has been fully built and launch already? how can anyone seeking to utilize the platform be able to get involved, Also is there a community like telegram group where admins can help out with question when ask. Thanks you

How much XEL is required for a Node? And is there a discord? The slack invite seems to be expired

Elastic has no masternode system (unless they#ve built on in the last few months and I completely missed it). Or do you mean the regular nodes? There are obviously nodes, but afaik, there's not collateral needed. It's basic block production layer is NXT-style PoS. On top of it is the computation layer, which works a bit like PoW. Since XELs supply is fixed, the only rewards are transaction fees. How much XEL is needed to be decently successful in producing blocks depends on the overall staking weight, I'm not familiar with the current situation.

Regarding Discord and stuff, not sure if there is one, but I don't use it anyway. You are free to create one, though.

This is a great project. I want to know if the platform has been fully built and launch already? how can anyone seeking to utilize the platform be able to get involved, Also is there a community like telegram group where admins can help out with question when ask. Thanks you

The project is really worth the attention and detailed study of the details and prospects for the future, as well as the purchase of Xel coins. And news and other basic services and resources for the project as always can be found on the first page. If you didn't know that, here: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1957064.0

This is a great project. I want to know if the platform has been fully built and launch already? how can anyone seeking to utilize the platform be able to get involved, Also is there a community like telegram group where admins can help out with question when ask. Thanks you

How much XEL is required for a Node? And is there a discord? The slack invite seems to be expired

Elastic has no masternode system (unless they#ve built on in the last few months and I completely missed it). Or do you mean the regular nodes? There are obviously nodes, but afaik, there's not collateral needed. It's basic block production layer is NXT-style PoS. On top of it is the computation layer, which works a bit like PoW. Since XELs supply is fixed, the only rewards are transaction fees. How much XEL is needed to be decently successful in producing blocks depends on the overall staking weight, I'm not familiar with the current situation.

Regarding Discord and stuff, not sure if there is one, but I don't use it anyway. You are free to create one, though.

How much XEL is required for a Node? And is there a discord? The slack invite seems to be expired

Elastic has no masternode system (unless they#ve built on in the last few months and I completely missed it). Or do you mean the regular nodes? There are obviously nodes, but afaik, there's not collateral needed. It's basic block production layer is NXT-style PoS. On top of it is the computation layer, which works a bit like PoW. Since XELs supply is fixed, the only rewards are transaction fees. How much XEL is needed to be decently successful in producing blocks depends on the overall staking weight, I'm not familiar with the current situation.

Regarding Discord and stuff, not sure if there is one, but I don't use it anyway. You are free to create one, though.

Good work but there is a question whether the developers are sitting there or not? Because the telegraph is also discussed, but the developers are silent there or very rarely go in that is not very good.